The wellness skull is a multi-purpose facility: it's cranium is a sauna & the neck is a bath. The sauna part of the skull allows you to contemplate life and death as you sweat out the evil and illness from your body. As you sit in the sauna feeling good - almost rejuvenated, you are reminded that the feeling is fleeting and death is imminent. People viewing the skull from the outside cannot escape this message. A huge representation of death stares them down as steam from the sauna streams from it's eyes. 

Created by Atelier Van Lieshout, the fiberglass skull sits outside of Vienna's contemporary art center Kunsthalle Wien. The skull is open to the public one Saturday a month. 

As stated on their website, Atelier Van Lieshout's recurring themes are " autarky, power, politics and the more classical themes of life and death." Which leads us to our next piece by AVL - The Sensory Depravation Skull. Yes, it's a bundle of cheer over at AVL as they set you up to once again examine your inner being, this time with a sensory deprivation skull. It looks comfy! 

Honestly, I think these pieces have a wonderful, dark sense of humor about them. Yes, they may encourage people to examine their thoughts on life and death, but they also have you sitting in a sauna located in a big skull that spits steam out of its eyes. 

[VIA]